


a pen neither scratchy, nor stub, nor rusty

by not_so_weary_pilgrim (orphan_account)



Category: Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Long Distance Relationships, Love Letters, time for a college NOT AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:53:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21567931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/not_so_weary_pilgrim
Summary: A collection of letters, sent to and from Queens in the months after 3x10
Relationships: Anne Shirley & Muriel Stacy, Gilbert Blythe/Anne Shirley, Marilla Cuthbert & Matthew Cuthbert & Anne Shirley
Comments: 17
Kudos: 319





	1. Gilbert

**Author's Note:**

> Each chapter title is the name of that respective letter's author

Dear Anne,

I am writing this to you from my room in Toronto. It is a clean, dry room in a safe neighborhood. The walls, floor and ceiling have all managed to be painted the same bland, dull grey that refuses to be brightened by the sunniest of days shining through my one small window. Still, it is warm and comfortable, though I do wish there was something about it that would give me scope for the imagination. I might feel closer to you that way.

Alas, rereading your letters and writing my own will have to suffice.

And on that subject – I greatly enjoyed your letter. It nearly beat me to my boarding house on my first day here! I hope you didn’t spend too much on express postage, but will hardly fuss even if you did.

While I hope it comes as no surprise to you that I adore your hair, I am very glad that you’ve found something to endear you to it. How wonderful for Matthew and Marilla to find you your parents’ book. I would love to see it when I come to visit, if you don’t mind sharing such a precious thing with me.

Speaking of – I do hope you’ll allow me to visit as much as possible. Naturally our course loads will require a great deal of dedication and study, but whenever we’re able I wish to be with you, close enough to hold your hand and feel your lips smile beneath mine.

I have to admit my face is a little red after writing that. I can practically hear Bash teasing me about being a ‘moke’.

Please, be sure to tell me if I’m too forward. I’ve never written a love letter before, and while it’s easier than I imagined (though I’m sure this has to do with my recipient rather than the subject matter) I find myself almost swept away in the memories of us in Charlottetown. I am hard pressed to put those moments into words.

I didn’t imagine it all, did I Carrots? The way you wrapped me in your arms so sweetly, and let me hold you closer than Marilla would have considered proper. I have never felt so loved before. For that is what it is, isn’t it, Anne? Love, all our own, fought for and earned and all the more treasured because of it. It is a nearly indescribable relief to write the word!

I am afraid, though, that the sweetness of those kisses will make the next seven years seem even longer. I feel horribly selfish, asking you to wait that long for me. But then I think of how your blue eyes shone up at me after I kissed you for the first time, all dappled and fathomless in the shade of the big maple tree in front of your boarding house. And I just can’t bring myself to care.

The dinner bell just rung. I had better sign off, and get this into the basket by the front door so it gets in the morning’s post. This isn’t a very long letter, I’m afraid, but I plan on making it up to you with another letter as soon as I can.

Since I was an idiot and didn’t tell you in Charlottetown:

I love you, Anne Shirley-Cuthbert. From now until the end of the age. And I can’t wait to tell you in person.

Yours,

Gilbert

P.S. While we’re on the subject of letters, do you mind telling me what yours that you left for me said? I never got a chance to read it.

P.P.S. Your confidence is one of my very favorite things about you. But please know that you have mine as well – there is not a shred of doubt in my mind that you will soar through your classes with flying colors. Rest well, my sweet Anne, so that you may better take Queens by storm on the morrow.


	2. Anne

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for all the interest in this story. I plan on continuing it no matter what happens, though I'm quite optimistic just looking at twitter.
> 
> also, if you're one of the garbage cans who bullied Lucas' girlfriend, please know that you are a disgrace to this fandom and the human species at large, and get away from my fic; it's not written for people like you.

My dearest Gilbert,

For a doctor, you certainly have a way with poetry. My first love letter, and I don’t see how you’ll ever best it. Of course, I look forward to you proving me wrong.

How wonderful it is, that we still can speak so freely with one another. I must confess that in the immediate wake of realizing my romantical feelings towards you, I was petrified that I would lose the friend and peer I had come to cherish. My heart is significantly lightened to know that the Anne and Gilbert of old times have not gone, only grown closer still. What a beautiful future to look forward to, of our light-hearted schoolroom bickering, now resolved in kisses and tender affections.

(Josie Pye is doing a terrible job of sneaking a peek at this letter over my shoulder; this is precisely why I prefer to write at my desk in mine and Diana’s room. But my darling Diana is revising most anxiously for her mathematics exam in a few days and I didn’t want to disturb her.

It might be worthwhile to find a nice writing spot out of doors or at the school library, if only to escape Josie’s scandalized lectures on how a lady does not speak of kissing. It is most improper, she says.

What a ridiculous idea. I can’t imagine anyone else I’d _rather_ discuss kissing with than you, Gil. Nor can I imagine anyone else with whom the conversation would be practical.)

Marilla and Matthew have sent me two letters already, full of cheery farm news and reports on Jerry’s book of the week. How I miss dear Green Gables! But Queen’s keeps me so busy that I have no time to sit and mope – until two o’clock on Saturday afternoons, when I imagine you walking into the parlor and sweeping me right off my feet. That is usually when I take myself for a stroll through the park down the street. There is one particular path that has _such_ scope for the imagination; it is not the same as having you, as you said, close enough to hold my hand. But it does help some, and I am usually in better spirits by the time I ramble back to the boarding house.

Goodness, you must think me terribly selfish to prattle on so. I would never wish for you to neglect your studies just to come see me, no matter how my heart aches. You will be the finest doctor in all of Canada; I don’t dare to be the silly girl who becomes an obstacle to your dreams. A few years of pining and letters will be worth the moment when we no longer must be apart. Please don’t take my melodramatics as a hint for you to board the next train. Come when you can, dearest, of course I will always be glad to see you. But let there be no guilt on your part for not spending every weekend in Charlottetown.

And besides, don’t we have our memories to sustain us? If I live to be a hundred Gilbert, I will never forget the look on your face when I saw you standing by the porch steps, nor the way you smiled at me when you bounded back out of that carriage to kiss me goodbye. Such pure, golden joy makes the parting bitter but the reunions all the sweeter. How I long to be in your arms again!

Speaking of that afternoon…I dearly wish you could have seen Diana’s face as you drove away. She maintains that if you had starting walking down the road whilst juggling fire batons she could not have been more astonished.

“Anne!” she said, “he kissed you! Twice!”

“Actually, my dear Diana,” said I with no small amount of glee, “He kissed me twice before you ever arrived, too.”

Diana then gave a gasp so loud and dramatic that her father thought something must be the matter, such as one of her trunks being forgotten at the train station. I hadn’t the heart to tell Mr. Barry that I had just behaved more improperly than anybody would dare to suppose, by kissing a boy like that in broad daylight.

But Diana, being my dearest bosom friend, longed to know the whole story. She appeared extremely smug upon finding out that you asked me about my feelings. I sensed something was afoot, and so I asked her and nearly cried – to think that all these weeks of misery and unhappiness could have been avoided had you only gotten to see my letter! I can’t imagine what must have happened to it, Gilbert. But I am more than happy to grant you your request:

I’m sorry I was confused before. I’m not anymore.

I love you.

Yours,

Anne

P.S. I must admit to a moment of losing my head – I was so distraught that you had not even the courage to face me after I left that letter for you that I quite ripped yours to shreds. I attempted to piece it back together, but was left with a rather incorrect impression. So, in the interest of fairness, what did your note to me say?

P.P.S. and how on earth did you find my room to leave it on my bureau?


	3. Gilbert

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These will be in chronological order, but there will be "missing" letters. As in, this isn't only the second letter Gilbert's written Anne. I'm planning on the series being sort of like outtakes, with every fifth chapter being a narrative instead a letter. Let me know please, if that sounds okay to all of you. I'm happy to tweak the plan!

Dear Anne,

You would love the campus here.

Not all parts of it, of course; they have actually begun clearing a large patch of trees behind the mathematics building and are planning to put in a gazebo and fountain instead. Seeing those beautiful old trees chopped down makes me glad you aren’t here to see it.

But there is one corner in particular that I discovered a few days ago. It is where I go now to read your letters, and to write them if I have a book with me to use as a hard surface. The library here is nestled right up against the woods, which makes some of the upstairs rooms lovely and cool in the warmer months. But I found a tiny abandoned garden around the back, with a low brick wall that is all overgrown with moss. There is a little grove of birch trees and some wild rose bushes that have sprung up in the years since this place has known a gardener. There is a particularly stout birch tree that has grown up so closely beside the garden wall that one can lean back against it as they sit atop the bricks.

That is where I am now, my beautiful Anne. You feel so close to me here, in this far-away corner where the smell of roses is in the air. Should you ever have the opportunity to visit Toronto, this will the very first place that I show you.

What a thought that is, of your hand in mine as we wander amongst the wild roses. I know of your aversion to pink (though I can’t say I agree with it) but some of the blooms here are white and a pale, soft yellow. I can’t help but imagine them twisted into a crown like the ones you used to make back in Avonlea.

Did I ever tell you how lovely I find you when you’ve got flowers in your hair? I don’t think I did. I shall have to remedy that, next time we meet.

I needed the solace of our garden today, as this week has proven to be one of the most challenging I’ve ever had, academically speaking. One of my professors seems to take great personal delight in crushing the ambitions of his pupils. He is of the same breed as Mr. Phillips, I’m afraid. Learning has become a chore whilst in his lecture hall, and on Fridays he is especially long winded. I feel quite wrung out by the time he finally dismisses us.

Enough of my complaints, I can already hear you starting to worry. Don’t fret, love. Our garden and my thoughts of you have lifted my spirits considerably.

Tell me of your own studies. Are you enjoying them? I won’t ask if you’re managing; the amount of doubt I have in you wouldn’t fill a thimble, Carrots. But a poor teacher can make things much more difficult. I hope you don’t have any professors of that sort, but if you do, then please know I am here to listen to any and all tirades you feel provoked to have.

The sun is beginning to set, Anne, so I had best return to the boarding house. I will try to write again over this weekend; hopefully I can start making plans to come and see you sometime soon. Until then, please take good care of yourself and remember – I love you, down to the marrow of my bones and with every breath that is in my body.

Yours,

Gilbert

P.S. I forgot to say that I can’t wait to kiss you again. And, just because it brings me such joy to write it – I love you, Anne.

P.P.S. Please give the enclosed note to Diana. It’s long overdue.

\--

Diana –

You scolded me like an erring child on the train that day, and because of it I am happier than I ever dreamed was possible. I am forever in your debt, and am happy to call you Anne’s friend as well as my own. Thank you.

Gilbert


End file.
